High-powered very large scale integration (VLSI) circuits are widely used in the electronics industry. Major uses of VLSI circuits include clock buffers, wordline drivers, and I/O buffers. Generally, VLSI circuits are comprised of a plurality of field effect transistors (FETs) laid out on a substrate. As transistors have decreased in size, the thickness of the silicon dioxide gate dielectric has steadily decreased to increase the gate capacitance and thereby drive current, raising device performance. However, as thickness has scaled below 2 nanometers, leakage currents due to tunneling have increased, which in turn have lead to higher power consumption and reduced device reliability. During their operation, VLSI circuits generate heat internally. This self-heating increases the junction temperature in the device, and can result in failure of the VLSI circuit.
In general, gates made using high-κ materials allow for increased gate capacitance with reduced associated leakage effects. The term high-K dielectric generally refers to a material with a high dielectric constant κ (as compared to silicon dioxide). High-κ dielectrics are used in semiconductor manufacturing processes where they are usually used to replace a silicon dioxide gate dielectric or another dielectric layer of a device. Some materials which have received considerable attention as high k gate materials are oxynitride (a silicon oxide dielectric that has been infused with a small amount of nitrogen), hafnium silicate, zirconium silicate, hafnium dioxide and zirconium dioxide.
Pressure sensors can be used to measure pressure variations in air as well as any other gas. The pressure variations in a sample gas are often measured against known values. These pressure variations can be an important parameter in determining various properties of a given gas sample. Pressure sensors that measure such pressure variations find widespread application in areas such as industrial process control, automobile engine monitoring and various biomedical processes. Such sensors would typically require high mechanical stability. Further, the sensors should have a good sensitivity and resolution to respective variations in pressure and temperature.